Give yourself a gift: forgive

Let's be honest: we all harbor resentments, hurts from past grievances, anger at someone we haven't spoken to for years. Many of us either don't want to forgive, or we don't realize how powerful forgiveness is, and how good it is for US to forgive.
Some of us have buried our resentments so deep inside that we have forgotten how our unwillingness to forgive is harming us in our lives.

Forgiveness, I think, has received the reputation of a nice, sentimental thing to do. Good people forgive. Good people forget. Good people are nice to the people who have hurt them, and they let them off the hook!

Forgiveness is much more real, much more powerful, and much more life-changing - and life-freeing - than the notions many of us hold of what "forgiveness" is.

Forgiveness is for you, for me, for us. Forgiveness is not about the person who has harmed us, intentionally or not. If you choose to forgive someone who has harmed you, you are letting yourself off the hook, not the other person. When you forgive another human being, you decide that what they did to harm you will no longer hurt you. That's it! You decide that what they did - intentionally or not - will no longer harm you.

You may not want to forget what someone has done to you in the past. For example, if someone you love has hit you or harmed you in some other way that leaves a lasting wound, it is important that you NOT forget what that person is capable of. You may not even want them in your life anymore. Forgiveness does not mean you trust someone who cannot be trusted with your safety, your life.

When you forgive, you let go of the "charge" you hold within you that binds you to someone else's behavior. You are set free!
When you forgive, you acknowledge your own humanity, and the humanity of the one who has hurt you.

Forgiveness takes practice.

Warmly,
meb